Cinnamon: nutrition and how to use it

Fun facts

• Cinnamon is the bark of a tree, peeled and dried until it curls into quills on its own. Trà My (Quảng Nam) and Văn Yên (Yên Bái) are Vietnam's famous cinnamon regions.
• The world has two main types: cassia cinnamon (including Vietnamese cinnamon), bold and spicy, and Ceylon cinnamon from Sri Lanka, which is milder.
• 100g of ground cinnamon has 247 kcal, 53.1g of fiber and 1,002mg of calcium. But a teaspoon is only about 2.6g, around 6 kcal, so the minerals you actually get are tiny.
• Vietnamese cooks use cinnamon in phở broth, bò kho beef stew, sweet chè, and even coffee.

Choosing and storing

Good cinnamon sticks are thick, oily and smell sweet and spicy when snapped. Sticks keep their aroma longer than powder, so buy sticks for broths and small amounts of powder for sprinkling. Store in a sealed jar, cool, dry and out of the sun.

Cooking it well

For broth, toast the stick briefly to wake up the aroma, then drop it in the pot. A sprinkle of cinnamon on oats, yogurt or roasted sweet potato adds warmth without extra sugar. Cinnamon makes sweet food taste sweeter, so it is a handy helper as you cut sugar step by step. Cassia cinnamon has more coumarin than Ceylon, so enjoy it as a spice rather than drinking big spoonfuls every day.

Frequently asked questions